The Only Thing Left Worth Fighting For
by x Bout as Stable as the Wind x
Summary: [zombie apocalypse AU] It's just him and Jamie now; and Danny's determined not to lose the only person left to him, the only thing left worth dying for. [non slash, Danny/Jamie bromance]


**A/N: This is my first "Blue Bloods" fanfiction, I adore the show, and I love Danny &amp; Jamie. So those are who this story stars, no slash; and, it's a zombie apocalypse version! I apologize for any OOCness, this is my first time writing the characters. I would really appreciate any review, no matter how short or small, to tell me what you guys thought and liked/disliked.**

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The situation would have been a hundred times less eerie if he hadn't been alone – that, and if there wasn't a growling, snarling corpse wandering down the aisles of the store several feet away. But he was used to the undead by now. What he _wasn't _used to was not having Danny behind him, protecting him, standing watch while he ran around trying to scavenge for supplies. Now, juggling cans in one arm while holding his pistol with the other hand, Jamie Reagan's breaths were coming out a little faster, and his pulse beating a bit more, and his actions more rushed and panicky than they would have been if his older brother had been by his side. _Slow down_, he reprimanded himself after he spilt a precious half liter of water all across the filthy aisles, barely managing to pick up the bottle before the rest of the liquid escaped. _Slow down, keep calm, focus and think straight. Danny's not outside clearing casualties just for you to screw everything up in here_. He took a few deep breaths, re-arranged his armload of goods, and began towards the front of the store at a slower, more controlled pace.

The 'casualty' – or the undead, freakish bastards, as Danny so affectional called them – started staggering over towards him as soon as he left the cover of the aisle shelves, mouth wide open, once-lean figure now bloated and rotting with one arm falling off. Jamie raised his gun, beginning to aim before remembering Danny's instructions to save bullets because ammo was scarce; he reluctantly lowered his weapon and hurried towards the doors. He could just make out his brother's silhouette outside through the foggy, grime-covered glass – he was using an ax and lopping off the zombies' heads, keeping the creatures away from their car. He sighed in relief at the sight, and jogged forward.

His eyes were glued to the sight of Danny, which was why he didn't see the second casualty come stumbling out from behind a checkout counter, teeth bared, eyes glazed over and gleaming with a sadistic gleam only the dead could achieve. It was on him in seconds, knocking him to the dirty tile floor, knocking the wind out of him as it attempted to rip out a chunk of his flesh to eat. He shoved it away from him, gasping desperately for air, while one trembling around grabbed his pistol and clicked the safety off. He took aim, then hesitated, remembrances of their low stock of bullets forcing him to not shoot, but instead flip the weapon over and ram the butt of the gun into the zombie's skull. The thing growled defiantly from where it lay on the ground, and it's skinny, once-female arms were still trying to grab him; so he hit it one more time, panting as it finally went still beneath his grip.

Only, now the beast from before was upon him, and he didn't have time to turn around and go on the defensive before the thing tackled him with his face to the floor and sank its decaying teeth into his shoulder.

"JAMIE!"

Danny Reagan had once thought nothing could frighten him to the point where the entire world blurred and his heart seemed to stop beating. He'd been proven wrong once before when the plague had first hit New York, and it happened a second time when one by one his family was either infected, killed, or just gone.

And now here was the third instance where he was downright, to the gut, mind-numbingly afraid. There was a bastard freak chewing away at _Jamie_. His only family left, the younger brother he'd sworn to protect at all costs. He screamed the younger man's name again, and sprinting forward as fast as his legs could carry him, he swung his ax in a high, sweeping arc, decapitating the creature in one desperate swing. The body fell, oozing black, rank fluid, and Jamie pushed himself his knees, shaking and pale.

"Jamie!" Dropping the ax, Danny sank down next to the blonde, his own trembling hands immediately going to the large tear in his brother's shirt, weakly preparing himself to feel the warm blood of the wound, readying himself for the days to come where Jamie would succumb to the plague's fever, before dying, before resurrecting as one of _them_.

Only, when his fingers brushed the shoulder the casualty had just been gnawing on, he didn't find any blood; yet he felt thick, hard Kevlar.

_The vest… oh God, his vest… _Unable to hold back a quaking exhale of relief, he clutched the shirt and sent an endless stream of mental thanks to the Almighty; he only stopped when he noticed Jamie's eyes were still wide and unfocused. Still panicked.

Danny cupped one sweaty palm around the back of his little brother's neck, and used the other hand to get Jamie to look at him. "You're alright, kid," he breathed, laughing weakly. "Bastard bit your vest, didn't get your skin. You're okay."

It took a few tries to get the younger man to hear his message; but once he did, Jamie smiled shakily and leaned against Danny in relief. "Oh, thank God…"

"Yeah, I've already overloaded the Big Man with gratitude already," he replied quietly. "C'mon, we've got to get out of here. Freaks are flooding in from everywhere."

Both brothers stumbled to their feet and grabbed the supplies that had spilt all over the floor. Jamie ran point, shooting down causalities, while Danny covered their rear with the ax. He watched his younger brother duck behind a police car, aiming at an entire herd of monsters; panic leapt into his throat, and he ran forward, grabbing the blonde's arm and pulling him forward. "C'mon! There's too many!"

They ran as fast as they could, and after traveling a block, they reached the old police station. The doors slammed shut behind them, and he locked them tight before shoving Jamie ahead of him. "Up the stairs," he whispered hoarsely, hearing groans approach from down the hall. Rushing up the steel, dark staircase, he made a mental note to try and find more building supplies as soon as possible. They still had yet to clear out the entire building – there was a large hole in the back wall that made keeping the entire structure secure difficult – and he knew they couldn't keep teasing that danger for long. They'd have to do something about that, and quickly.

When they reached the top floor, they pushed open the door and finally allowed themselves to slow down a bit. They pushed the desks back in front of the door, Danny flipped the lock; and then both brothers sank to the floor, breathing heavily, sweat pouring down their faces and creating clean streaks in the grime that covered them from head to toe.

Before a full minute had passed, however, Jamie forced himself to his feet, grabbing his backpack and making his way into the former commissioner's office, pulling a bottle of Gatorade out of the bag while he did so. When he reached what had once been Frank Reagan's desk, Danny watched his brother kneel down next to an unmoving figure laid out behind the furniture, wrapped like a mummy in blankets. He could barely hear Jamie whisper, "C'mon, you need to drink. Dad_. _C'mon. Drink." Danny didn't hear any reply, but he saw Jamie hover over the figure and tip the bottle so that their father could take a few sips of the liquid.

He got up himself and slowly walked over to where Jamie was twisting the cap back onto the bottle. He knelt next to the barely breathing form of Frank Reagan, chewing on his lower lip and running a hand over his head. "Ah, Dad…"

Frank Reagan eyes fluttered, but did not open. The bite would on his arm reeked of infection and festering flesh, and the bandage was soaked with black, dried blood and pus.

"He barely drank anything," Jamie said quietly, staring at the older man lying on the floor. "He hasn't opened his eyes today either." His voice was dejected, dull. "I don't… I'm pretty sure he's not going to make the night."

He bowed his head, closed his eyes, accepted the fact with a darkening sense of dread and grief. One hand wandered over to his brother's shoulder, and he clutched onto the feeling of Jamie there, alive, healthy, still with him. "Someone will have to keep watch on him at all times," he choked out, clearing his throat. "We'll take turns."

Jamie nodded numbly, and Danny squeezed his shoulder.

"I'll go first."

**xXx**

He had used to find New York, at night, a beautiful sight, with the thousands of lights twinkling like stars against the darkness. Now, with the grid down, the island off the mainland was just a black hole, not a light in sight. No signs of life outside himself and Jamie; and the realization sent chills up his spine, as it always dead. He looked up at the sky, all blank except for the clouded full moon, and wondered if God and his family were looking down at him. Wondered if Joe and Linda and Sean and Jack and Mom and Erin and Nicki and Henry were all watching him with pity in their eyes, waiting for him to be next. Or Jamie. But no, that couldn't happen. Because there was no way that Danny was going to outlast Jamie. His brother was the only person left to him on this forsaken planet, the only thing left worth fighting – and _dying _– for. No, if either one of them were going to go down, they would do it together. And not for a long time. He'd told Jamie that when everything had first started going to hell, and he repeated it to himself now.

_Lord, give us strength_.

Inside the building, Jamie sat on a dusty, cushioned chair, hearing Danny pace around on the weakening roof. The building was slowly crumbling, just like the rest of the world. How much longer they could stay here was a question that haunted him. They'd attempted to escape the island before, earlier on; but then Frank had been bitten and they'd been forced to stop moving. _But that won't be a problem soon_, he thought bitterly, closing his eyes and tightening his grip on his pistol. _It's just not _fair_._

The creaking of a floorboard made his eyes snap open.

He turned his head slowly towards the direction of the noise; and noticed that one of his father's legs was twitching beneath the blanket. If fact, Frank's entire body was rolling over, as if getting up.

"Dad?" He straightened in the chair, and then stood up completely, heart pounding. "Dad?"

Frank Reagan stood up, and looked at his son.

Only… it wasn't Frank Reagan anymore.

The man's eyes were milky and gray, his face a distorted purple hue mottled with blackish streaks, as if his veins had filled with oil to the point where they bulged and pressed against the sickly skin. A small stream of bile and blood dripped from his mouth, and he snarled.

Jamie's eyes went wide, and he backed up until he was pressed against the wall as the Frank-thing started towards him, shuffling, the creature in his father's body clumsy and constantly bumping into the desk and chairs as it came towards him. Jamie clicked the safety off his gun, raised it, centered it on his dad's forehead. He'd done this before, to Vinny, his partner and friend. To neighbors, and to total strangers.

But not to family.

The kids had gone first, and it had been the military to put Nicki and Jack and Sean down, while their parents screamed in the background. Erin was next, and Frank had mournfully dealt her a bullet to the head when she'd attacked Linda. He hadn't been quick enough though. Linda got bit, and soon died. Danny bid his wife goodbye before stabbing her through the skull.

Henry had been shot down, mistaken for a casualty by a trigger-happy policeman.

And Danny had put that man down too, in his furious rage.

Frank had been shoving his two sons to safety on a broken fire escape when a freak had taken out a chunk of his arm. They had been in an alley, surrounding, nowhere to go. Danny was on the fire escape already, screaming at the top of his lungs for them to hurry. A casualty had lunged, snapping its jaws; Frank had, in a burst of strength, grabbed Jamie and thrust him upward into his brother's arms before crying out at the agony that burst from his arm, along with blood and torn tissue.

That had been three days ago, and as the Frank-thing limped across the office, Jamie found his weapon lowering, his fingers unable to pull the trigger. He pressed himself further against the wall, sucking in trembling breaths, his vision growing blurred and hot and wet. "I'm sorry," he gasped, shaking his head. "This is all my fault, Dad… I'm so sorry…" He tried taking aim again, but found himself unable to.

He couldn't do it. He couldn't shoot down his own father, who'd given his life to get _him _to safety.

Suddenly, the Frank-thing had an eruption of speed, and hurled itself at Jamie, teeth dripping with drool as they made to clamp down on a its first meal. And Jamie screamed his father's name.

**xXx**

Danny heard Jamie's cry immediately from the rooftop, and terror gushed through his veins as he tore open the door and leapt down the stairs, ax already in hand. "JAMIE!"

He entered the office to find his Jamie lying on the ground, gun in hand, kicking away his zombified father as the thing tried to tear into his brother's flesh. He ran forward, swinging the ax high as he maneuvered around chairs, piles of supplies, and the commissioner's desk. "JAMIE! SHOOT! SHOOT HIM, JAMIE!"

Jamie had the gun, but he wasn't shooting the Frank-thing. He was still kicking the thing away weakly, and when Danny finally reached him, the zombie had grabbed the younger man's ankle and lowering its teeth over the appendage.

"DAD, NO!"

The ax split former-Frank-Reagan's skull in two, and the undead body stopped moving only a half-centimeter above Jamie's ankle. It collapsed onto the floor, eyes wide open, mouth slack; Danny dealt it another blow just to be safe before dropping to his knees next to Jamie, taking the kid in his arms, checking him over before growling.

"You need to shoot, no matter what!" he shouted, shaking Jamie to get him to look at him, terrified of what had just happened. Jamie had almost died, not because he didn't have bullets, but because he couldn't use them. "I know it's hard, I know it hurts, but you have to do it! That wasn't Dad, Jamie! It was a monster, and it wanted _to kill you_! If I ever turn, I need to know you can put me down, take the threat out of me! I need to know that you can stay alive if I'm not here to protect you!"

"I can't!" Jamie replied suddenly, breaking him off, tears burning his eyes as he stared desperately at his brother. "There's no point to it, Danny!"

"What are you talking about?!"

At that moment, a heavy body slammed against the door of the office, growling and screeching. And then, the whole hallways seemed to be full of zombies, because the door creaked and several fingers appeared under the door.

"SHIT!" Danny grabbed Jamie, hauled the younger man to his feet, and they both started up to the rooftop, leaving Frank's body lying in his office.

"SHUT THE DOOR! BAR IT!" he hollered at the top of his lungs, slamming shut the roof door just as he heard the one in the office collapse. He locked it with the padlock, and spotted the box of supplies he always kept up here in case of emergencies, shoved the thing in front of it. Then, he turned around. "Alright, we've gotta get down the fire escape, find another place to stay the night so we can…"

His voice trailed off when he spotted Jamie near the edge of the rooftop, leaning over, staring below.

"Kid?" He jogged over, stared at Jamie, and then looked down.

The entire alleyway and the closest two streets were completely _packed _with the bastards, to the point the ground looked just like a moving ocean, with nothing solid. He gaped, hands just beginning to barely tremble. "God help us," he murmured.

"He can't hear us," Jamie whispered next to him, voice deflated and weak.

Danny looked at him, wearily, as Jamie continued, "There's no more point in fighting, Danny. It's over."

He couldn't believe it. There had to be a way out, had to! "Don't say that, kid. We'll get out of this, lemme just think for a minute…"

Jamie turned to him, exasperated, fresh tears falling from his eyes. "No! Don't you get it! We'll get out of here, _without _Dad, just to get chased around again! There's no way to escape this thing, Danny, it's over! For all of us!"

"No! NO! I'm gonna fix this!" He ran over to the other side of the roof, looked around. "Hang in there, Jamie, I'll get us out of here!"

"YOU CAN'T, DANNY!" Jamie shouted. "THERE'S NO WHERE TO _GO_!"

"I'LL GET US OUT OF HERE!"

"DAD'S _DEAD_, Danny! Dad's…" The younger man sank to the floor, leaning against the edge of the roof. "…Dad's dead…"

For the first time, that fact hit him like a brick, and he stopped abruptly, letting it sink it. Their father was dead. Frank Reagan was _dead_. Gone forever. And it was just him and Jamie. He denied the tears were there in his eyes, but he let them fall anyway as he slowly walked over to the next side of the roof, looking over just to see more zombies. "I-I'll get us out of here, Jamie," he murmured. "I-I'll fix this."

"You can't fix it, Danny," Jamie whispered somewhere behind him. "There's only one way out now."

Something in that phrase sounded off, so he spun around, eyes going wide.

Because Jamie was standing there with his pistol pressed against his temple.

"JAMIE!"

"There's no point in running anymore! Dad's gone, the world is gone, and God can't hear us anymore!"

"That's not true! Get that damn thing away from your head, _now_!"

The casualties groaned and growled from the stairwell and the streets below. Jamie cringed at the noise, and shook his head.

"Jamie, c'mon! He took a step forward.

Suddenly, the kid was throwing a gun into his hands; Danny caught it, and stared at it, bewildered. It was Dad's gun.

"We can do it together," Jamie proposed weakly, almost sounding hopefully. "Go out together, just like you said. I don't want you to have to fight alone, Danny, but I can't do it anymore. Not when there's nothing left worth fighting for, dying for."

"Yes, there is! YOU! I'm fighting for YOU! We fight for EACH OTHER!"

"And how long do you think we'll last together, Danny? A week? Maybe even a month? And then I'll get bit or eaten alive, and you'll be all alone. I don't _want _that for you."

"DON'T SAY THAT!"

"C'mon, Danny. Please? Don't stop me? You can do it too. We can do it together."

Danny Reagan stared at his little brother, eyes glazed over in disbelief and shock, hands clutching a gun that he'd once watched his father carry around every day of his life.

All around, the zombies moaned, the new masters of an Earth not worth fighting for. Not worth dying for.

***end***

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**A/N: so here's one of my infamous endings where I let the reader decide what happened. Do you think the brothers made it off the rooftop together, safely? Or did the zombies get them first? Or did Danny let a grieving, confused Jamie lead him into 'opting out'. It's all up to you.**

**Reviews appreciated! :D**


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